Shotlist

Simon Rodilla, born in Italy and long-time inhabitant of Watts, had it in his mind to do something big. He became a "builder of defiant towers", gathering up discarded materials over the years and reassembling them slowly into structures looming high above his neighbors' homes.




Ken Smith comments: This documentary has "pretentious UCLA filmmaker" stamped all over it, from the pompous narration to the artsy camera angles to the annoying flute/piano/viola score. "The last place on Earth to search for the extraordinary." The story of Simon Rodia, tilesetter. "With the debris of a machine-ridden civilization he gave color and texture and vitality to the Towers as they arose out of his inner necessity." lots of CUs of Simon's gnarled hands; cements busted ceramic plates and mugs and tiles all over the metal framework of his 100+ foot towers; typical folk art junk: bottles, teapots; "he had an urgent need for expression"
"Dis-a was all my own idea" "All man's slow, tormented, enduring steps toward some light undefined -- may be here." "I had it in my mind to do something big and I did."
[This film is about the Watts Towers in south central Los Angeles, California]
Photographs of ancestors
Man filing
Piles of bottles and tiles
Man climbing tower structures
Suburban street with towers rising above the fences and rooftops
Close-up of man's face, shot from beneath
Close-up shots of the glass and broken tiles used to construct the towers

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